Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Continuing on my review of entries in the Mini Castle Contest, I go on to Brickshelf user Legostein aka Chris Deck entered a micro version of set 6074 Black Falcon's Fortress:

Instantly recognizable to all castle fans, Chris captures the set's look with the use of the 1x1 tile as a flag, and the yellow window frame as the entry arch. An excedingly small creation, but very obvious as to what it is.

We move on to bartosza6m's entry, which won the mini set category, 6081 King's Mountain Fortress.

A personal favorite of mine, this incorporates many cool ideas. From the simple 1x1 grey plates that make up the printing on the baseplate, to excellent tree on the corner, to the use of a cheese slope as the ghost, this little creation is excellently done. Very detailed, and very recognizable.

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Spencer Rezkalla has a display of his microscale skyscrapers that will be running at the Henry Ford Museum near Detroit through January 3. For close-up pictures of each of these, be sure to check his Brickshelf and MOCpage sites. Congratulations, Spencer, on this great venue.

Friday, November 13, 2009

Alright, lets get down to highlighting some of the entries in the MCC. I'm going to highlight one of the winners I mentioned earlier, followed by a different entry.

Lets start with 2 Much Caffeine's entry, which won third place, Kingdom in a Box.

Obviously, the uniqueness of having been made to fit within this box is what makes this MOC what it is. Other points of note to micro fans are the scale of it. On average, most micro creations are of a larger scale than this. Obviously the small the scale, the harder the build. The use of the tooth bricks as trees is an outstanding idea. The waterfall as well is a beauty to look at, and it is so simple, but it's those small things that make the MOC great. The way the road and the water continue into the drawers is also a nice touch.

New to the field of micro, NewRight never the less made a bold stab at it. The use of the plumes on top of the towers is both a brilliantly effective, and to the best of my knowledge, unique. The 1x1 round plates, while the simplest of pieces, is used well to give the castle the effect of pillars. I also enjoy the somewhat jumbled appearance of the towers on the castle, its makes for a nice break from the typically uniform look most micro castles get.

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

With the conclusion of the Mini Castle Contest V, with prizes soon to be on their way, and threads soon to pulled down, I though it might be interesting to go back and look at the last five years of micro building.

In 2005 I started a thread for a small little contest (yes, pun very much intended) and was pleasantly surprised by the six-page affair it turned into. Granted, the first page or two was just people trying to get their heads around just what micro was exactly. I’d like to think that after five annual contests, castle micro is a bit more understandable, and with any luck, has helped people uncover a new area of creativity. The five contests have been relatively close in amount of entries, but I think I can say the average level of skill rose with each year.

So in total, there has been 102 MOCs built for this contest, plus a special category the last two years. And with winners from all corners of the globe (I know cause my wallet screamed every time I had to go and mail out the prize).

So that’s a brief synopsis of the past contests. I am curious though where people would you like to see the MCC go from here. Is there anything they feel needs to be changed; a particular rule they think doesn't apply anymore? Do they think the judging is fair? That the time slot is the best? That the length of the contest is adequate?

Some specific questions that have come to mind over the last little while, which some feedback on would great.

Do you think the different special category is a good idea?

Would you rather see several specific categories every year, or none at all?

Do you feel having the contest right before the CCC affects it at all?

The contest has gone on for five years, and with luck, it'll go on for at least that many more, but I'd like to make sure the contest is something you people enjoy.

Thank you all, especially the people who donated the prizes, and the management of Classic-Castle, it's been a great five years!

In the next few days I will be highlighting some of the entries for this year's contest, both the winners and those not yet shown here.

Friday, November 06, 2009

DK Publishers recently released a boxed set: The LEGO Book, all about the hobby and another about minifigs (celebrating their 30th anniversary). There is a lot of great information about the company, the various sets, the Legoland parks, and more. Perhaps coolest of all is the inclusion of (a few) fan MOCs. From the MicroBricks viewpoint, they include pictures of the line of LEGO Architecture sets designed by Adam Reed Tucker and also a discussion of the 2005 contest that started off the LEGO Factory line. They challenged fans to design microscale MOCs and the winners were released as official sets.